REPUBLIKA.CO.ID, JAKARTA -- Indonesia President Joko Widodo (Jokowi) comitted the government continues focus on building massive infrastructure throughout the region. This effort purposely to improve the competitiveness of infrastructure index of the country.
Jokowi stated at a meeting with infrastructure activists on the occasion of the 78th PU Doctrine Day at Istana Negara, Jakarta, Monday (4/12/2023).
“And the most important thing, I see in terms of our infrastructure index is that at the time in 2014, we were still lagging behind in the IMD Global Competitiveness Index of our infrastructure field at the time at 54, It is currently at rank 51st. It means increasing even though it hasn't jumped,” He said.
Jokowi said that the hard work in carrying out infrastructure development was also paying off. During this time, he said, the government has completed construction of 42 dams. That number will continue to increase in 2024.
In addition, irrigation has been built to irrigate 1.2 million hectares of agricultural land. The construction of the expressway has also reached 2,143 km.
“A big leap for us but if we compare it with the expressways that exist in China we have a total of almost 3 thousand less than 3 thousand km. Toll roads in the PRRT how many sir minister does anyone know? 190 thousand kilometers,” Jokowi continued.
Not only that, the total number of dams Indonesia has is still far inferior to Korea. To date, Indonesia has a total of almost 300 dams, while in Korea it has reached 20,000 dams and in China it has 98 thousand dams.
In addition, the government has also only built 5,700 km of national roads in the last nine years.
“So it's still a long way off. It still needs hard work, although yes we are making a leap,” he said.
Jokowi continued, the infrastructure development was also done to welcome various major events in Indonesia, such as Asian Games 2018, G20 summit, ASEAN summit, etc. Infrastructure development, he said, is necessary for community connectivity as well as goods.
He said that the development of this infrastructure is prioritized by the government in order to create logistics cost efficiency. Thus, Indonesia can compete with other countries and also increase state investment.
“It's not possible for investors to come if our infrastructure is bad. Going to an island is not possible because there is no airport, if you want to go to an island you cannot because there is no sea port. You don't want to go to an island because there is no road,” he said.
In addition, infrastructure development is also necessary to create new economic growth points and also as social and cultural connectivity.
“The infrastructure also unites. Because there is an airport Acehnese people can fly directly to Papua. From Papua you fly to Java, from Java you can fly to Borneo and Sulawesi. The function is once again also unifying,” Jokowi explained.
The president also reminded of the importance of planning and preparation of development in order to be more comprehensive. He exemplifies that the construction of roads should also be carried out with drainage works and also sidewalks.
“So it should be a way of thinking we have a planning package. The roads, drainage, sidewalks, the landscape are all prepared because if only the road happened later, people would have been on the side of the road not made sales before, well, it would have been straight away. At the foot of the five stalls on the roadside, if you want to create a drainage sidewalk, there must be another social cost in the future,” he said.
On this occasion, the President also praised the acceleration of budget realization in the Ministry of PUPR. According to him, the budget realization carried out by the Ministry of PUPR was faster than other ministries.
“The PUPR ministry is usually the most advanced in budget realization, January must have started because the contract was earlier than what I saw, compared to other ministries it always precedes it which is good, January starts,” Jokowi said
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